By Charles Cole, University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa
My name is Charles Cole, and I’m an undergraduate student at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa studying Geography and Environment. My interests focus on the relationships between people, ecosystems, and conservation. I’ve always been fascinated by systems; ecological systems, social systems, and the ways different forms of life interact with one another across landscapes.
Outside of school, I spend much of my time outdoors surfing, hiking, backpacking, spearfishing, and exploring coastlines. I also run an independent conservation and outreach project documenting sections of the California coastline and proposing routes for the developing California Coastal Trail. During which, I advocate for public access protections and encourage conservation through recreation and environmental connection.
At its core, the project is about helping people recognize that the ocean is not separate from us, but part of a larger living system that directly shapes our lives and well-being. That broader perspective of intrinsic stewardship is also what led me toward my research in Nepal.
This summer, I’ll be traveling to Upper and Lower Dolpo in the trans-Himalayan region of Nepal as part of the Nepal Himalaya Student-Led Research Collective. My research project examines human–snow leopard coexistence within communities of Shey Phoksundo National Park.
The project asks a relatively simple question: How can conservation efforts support both wildlife protection and the well-being of local communities?
Snow leopards occupy a unique position in Dolpo. They are both predators and sacred beings. In many communities, they are viewed as spiritually significant animals connected to mountain entities and local cosmologies. At the same time, they also prey on livestock that families depend on for survival.
As modernization, economic pressures, and outside conservation systems increasingly shape the region, some of the traditional relationships between people, predators, and landscapes are changing. In some cases, snow leopards are now being killed in retaliation for livestock depredation.
This complexity is what draws me to the project.
A lot of modern conservation approaches treat nature as something separate from people, something to be managed from the outside through policy, regulation, or statistics alone. But I’m increasingly interested in understanding how communities have historically lived within ecosystems rather than simply extracting from them.
I want to learn how local communities in Dolpo traditionally approached coexistence with wildlife and compare those approaches with the methods currently being implemented by organizations such as the World Wildlife Fund (WWF). Some conservation initiatives have created tension locally, and I’m interested in understanding why. I want to know how local people perceive these programs, what they believe is working, what they believe is not working, and what kinds of solutions already exist within the community itself.
During fieldwork, I’ll travel between settlements throughout Shey Phoksundo National Park, conducting interviews with herders, conservation practitioners, park staff, and community members while also documenting grazing landscapes, livestock management systems, and conservation infrastructure.
Much of this work will happen while trekking between villages and high mountain grazing areas. In many ways, the journey itself is part of the research process. Spending time in the landscape, moving between settlements, and building relationships through conversation and shared experience allows for a much deeper understanding than simply arriving, collecting data, and leaving.
I want this project to avoid becoming extractive. Our collective is not only conducting research but also operating as a mobile health clinic, using 3D mapping to create a register of Dolpopa monasteries in need of repair, and distributing organic crop seeds to support local initiatives intended to strengthen long-term community resilience and self-sufficiency.
I’m not traveling to Dolpo because I think I already understand the answers.
I’m going because I suspect local communities understand dimensions of conservation and coexistence that many modern systems overlook. By doing so, I can understand how they define environmental balance, what problems they see that outsiders may miss, and what lessons their experiences might offer to broader conversations about conservation around the world.
Ultimately, my interest in this project comes from a larger belief that environmental health and human health are deeply connected. Conservation is not only about protecting wildlife populations or preserving landscapes as isolated spaces. Healthy ecosystems influence mental health, physical survival, culture, spirituality, food systems, and community stability.
I think one of the great challenges of modern society is that many people have become disconnected from the very systems that sustain them.
As I prepare for this experience, I’m excited to learn from communities whose relationship with the landscape is very different from my own. At the same time, I feel a responsibility to approach this work carefully and respectfully.
I expect that the Himalayas will challenge many of my assumptions, not only about conservation, but also how humans relate to the living world itself.
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